Humanities desk
< June 19	<< May \| June \| Jul >>	June 21 >

Welcome to the Wikipedia Humanities Reference Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages.

June 20

U.S. Olympic sponsors

I know sponsors of the U.S. Olympic Team tend to come and go. One was Kodak (worldwide), another was AT&T (domestic). Pan Am Airlines was their official carrier during the 1984 Winter Olympics. Delta Air Lines was their official carrier during the 1996 Summer Olympics and the 2002 Winter Olympics. But it's understood United Airlines has been, and continues to be a proud sponsor of Team USA. Still, I get confused on how many sponsors (worldwide and/or domestic) are there to stay. Anyone know?2604:2000:7113:9D00:B81E:C008:E611:FADF (talk) 06:51, 20 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Have you seen http://teamusa.org/sponsors? Rojomoke (talk) 09:56, 20 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Why was the Grenfell tower in Kensington?

If the Grenfell tower was subsidized accommodation for poor people, why was it in a wealthy neighborhood like Kensington? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Clipname (talk • contribs) 19:26, 20 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

There's housing projects in a pretty expensive part of New York at 10th Avenue and 61st Street. But yes, this kind of thing isn't the norm in some cities. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 20:21, 20 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

It's on the Lancaster West Estate in North Kensington (what most of us would call Ladbroke Grove), not the neighbourhood/area of Kensington (a mile or so to the south east) where all the really posh bits are. Both are in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. Most council areas, no matter how affluent, have to provide social housing in their catchment area. Lancaster West has approx 1000 other council owned houses/flats apart from Grenfell. The tower itself was a mix of social and private tenancies, with some private flats being rented at up to £2000/month[1] Average rent for flats in the immediate area being around £1500/month and average house prices are approx £220,000 which is around half the average London house price of £471,000 but around the national average of £232,530. Nanonic (talk) 21:11, 20 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Even the most wealthy areas need people to do the poorly paid and less pleasant jobs. Someone has to empty the dustbins in Kensington - hence the need for subsidised social housing in such an area. People on low wages cannot afford to commute into the city from less expensive areas a long way out. Wymspen (talk) 21:41, 20 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Are there really no affordable areas within a reasonable Tube commute of Kensington? Do Tube fares have no bulk discounts or unlimited monthly passes or (since Britain's left of America) low income discounts? Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 22:11, 20 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

London Transport Travelcards are unlimited travel passes for a fixed flat fee and are available for 1 and 7 days, 1 month and 1 year durations.[2]. Free bus travel is available to London residents over 60. Blooteuth (talk) 22:48, 20 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I see. The senior fare's $1.35 in New York and the age is 65. Also the day card is discontinued and there are no year cards. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 23:52, 20 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Historically, North Kensington was a deprived area, and the Lancaster West Estate was built to replace slum housing; the construction of social housing therefore made sense. The Right to Buy has led much former council housing to enter the private market, and in some cases to become gentrified, but a fairly run-down tower block is not a very desirable place for tenants to buy, so many of the flats remained as social housing. Warofdreams talk 00:18, 21 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

London (and for all I know other British cities) is full of places where ultra rich and very poor live cheek-by-jowl. I don't know to what extent this is due to town planning or accidents of history, I suspect more the latter, but government policy on social housing and the amazing work of housing associations, which between them own a staggering proportion of the homes in this country have had an impact, and, for my money, prevent ghettoisation and no-go areas. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 15:50, 21 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

And historically, each borough council in the UK had a duty to clear away slum housing and rehouse the inhabitants in affordable accommodation (the Housing Act 1930 is the legislation). Our article, Public housing in the United Kingdom gives the full rundown. Alansplodge (talk) 09:26, 22 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

On one view, making rich and poor people live in adjoining buildings prevents ghettoisation and no-go areas; on another, it creates ghettoisation and no-go areas in every borough, especially when council and charity housing is clearly visually marked, e.g. by exposed corridors and standard issue plaques, and especially in areas where council housing is large scale and poorly maintained. An alternative solution that has been tried is to give the former slum-dwellers the opportunity to move to proper housing in the outer suburbs, and it is debatable which solution has been more successful. --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 10:18, 22 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]